California’s largest wildfire explodes in size as fires rage across US West

More than 130 structures have been destroyed by this fire so far, and thousands more are threatened as evacuations were ordered in four counties: Butte, Plumas, Tehama and Shasta.

Thousands of firefighters were battling a wildfire in northern California on Saturday that exploded in size, scorching an area about the size of Los Angeles — one of several blazes tearing through the western United States and Canada amid dry, hot and windy conditions.

The forecast called for cooler temperatures that could help slow the Park Fire, the largest blaze so far this year in California. The Park Fire’s intensity and dramatic spread led fire officials to make unwelcome comparisons to the monstrous Camp Fire, which burned out of control in nearby Paradise in 2018, killing 85 people and torching 11,000 homes.

More than 130 structures have been destroyed by this fire so far, and thousands more are threatened as evacuations were ordered in four counties: Butte, Plumas, Tehama and Shasta.

The fire stood at 480 square miles (1,243 square kilometers) on Friday night and was moving quickly north and east after igniting Wednesday when authorities said a man pushed a burning car into a gully in Chico and then calmly blended in with others fleeing the scene.

“There’s a tremendous amount of fuel out there and it’s going to continue with this rapid pace,” Cal Fire incident commander Billy See said at a briefing. He said the fire was advancing up to 8 square miles (21 square kilometers) an hour on Friday afternoon.

Officials at Lassen Volcanic National Park evacuated staff from Mineral, a community of about 120 people where the park headquarters are located, as the fire moved north toward Highway 36 and east toward the park.

Communities elsewhere in the U.S. West and Canada also were under siege Saturday from a fast-moving blaze sparked by lightning that sent people fleeing on fire-ringed roads in rural Idaho to a new blaze that was causing evacuations in eastern Washington.

In eastern Oregon, a pilot was found dead in a small air tanker plane that crashed while fighting one of the many wildfires spreading across several Western states.